1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to generating a spectral estimation parameter, which are used for estimating a spectrum of spectral reflectivity of a subject, from a multiband image of the subject taken with and output from a multiband camera, and estimating the spectrum of spectral reflectivity of the subject with the spectral estimation parameter.
2. Description of the Related Art
There is a proposed method of estimating a spectrum of spectral reflectivity of a subject from a multiband image of the subject taken by and output from a multiband camera. This prior art estimating method provides a conversion table in advance for each wavelength band (also referred to as “band”) of a multiband image and converts the multiband image of the subject into a set of values of reflectivity according to the conversion tables, so as to estimate the spectrum of spectral reflectivity of the subject.
This prior art method, however, allows highly-accurate estimation of the spectrum of spectral reflectivity from only a multiband image having a significantly large number of bands. The respective bands for measurement are set in advance and may not be optimal for the multiband camera or the subject. The multiband image having the large number of bands is accordingly essential for highly-accurate estimation of the spectrum of spectral reflectivity.